


Aquaphobia

by gardenjays



Category: Lego Ninjago
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Character Turned Into a Ghost, Gen, I know this is based in s5 so there's already ghosts but there are More Ghosts, I was yelling when I found out I can tag all the ghosts omg, I'll probably update tags as I go, can you tell I don't really look at ninjago ao3 I'm sorry, there are a few swears in here so be warned
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:33:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24017527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gardenjays/pseuds/gardenjays
Summary: He kept jerking his movements just a tiny bit as he turned to face them. The boy they were looking at now was definitely not Jay. His eyes were green, bright blinding green like a neon light, nothing even close to natural. When he saw the ninja he grinned darkly and hopped back onto the platform.“Give me my weapon, boy.”***an alternate version of season 5 where the ghosts are smart and Lloyd isn't the only one who gets possessed(originally posted on tumblr in 2017, wasn't finished but I'm going to finish it this time)
Comments: 11
Kudos: 46





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> back in 2016/17 I had this idea, what if the ghosts in season 5 possessed ALL the ninja instead of just Lloyd? that would make things a bit easier for them, wouldn't it?
> 
> originally posted on [tumblr](https://thatoneninjagosideblog.tumblr.com/tagged/ghost-au)
> 
> anyway this is extremely self-indulgent and I'm making heavy edits and reposting on ao3 and I plan to finish it this time! on the off-chance you already read this (I love you, first of all) you will want to skim over it again because I've taken out some parts and elaborated on others. basically I rewrote a lot.

Everything was complete nothingness. Everything, and yet nothing. That couldn’t be possible, could it?

He blinked and rubbed his eyes. _He_ quite clearly existed, so there couldn’t really be _nothing_ here.

After opening his eyes he saw a faint green light that seemed to be coming from everywhere. Tiny specks of dust floated around him, shining in the weird light. It was uncomfortable, not welcoming and not friendly at all. The color of it actually made him sick, but he didn’t feel like he could do anything about it.

He tried moving again and realized that he was somehow suspended in this void. Maybe he was moving, but if he was floating around in the middle of nowhere with nothing around him to place as a landmark, he wasn’t really going anywhere, was he?

He rubbed his eyes again and tried to think back. What was this place? How did he get here?

There was a dim memory of a desert. A lot of desert and a hot sun beating down on him.

_“Dude, your face is so red. That’s gotta be the nastiest sunburn I’ve ever seen.”_

_“It’s not my fault Kai led us in the wrong direction all day! We’ll be lucky if we make it to Stiix before Morro at this rate.”_

His legs had been sore after too many hours on the back of some yak-ish...thing. After the sun had set he could still feel the burn on his face like it was emitting its own heat. The cool air helped a bit though, and the clear skies so far away from civilization gave him the most beautiful view of the stars he had ever remembered seeing.

Compared to this empty green void he wished he could see it again, and his friends too. Where were they anyway? If he was the only one here, what happened to the others?

He closed his eyes and tried to remember more. There had to be more.

They were stopping at a little abandoned station after following some railroad tracks. A short rest to stretch their legs and maybe get a drink from the water tower. Then he remembered the noises, the running motor and the distant cackle. There shouldn’t have been anything but them out there, but another voice had come from nowhere. A ghost. A horrible mean and angry ghost showed up. There was a fight and they couldn’t figure out how to stop him. Nothing could stop a ghost! For a moment they thought that a passing train had gotten him, but a second later he was back and then—

Jay opened his eyes and took a sharp breath in. That’s what this place was. The ghost had flown at him and then there was darkness, and then he was here, wherever _here_ was. His own mind? That was creepy. And if he was here, who knew what the ghost was doing in the real world, at the train station where his friends were? He had to try to fight back, but the sickly glow of the light was too distracting. He was too tired. But he couldn’t just give up, he wouldn’t. The others depended on him. He was going to fight.

There was an eerie silence as the dust settled. Cole counted in his head, an old habit from when he had been their leader way back in the day, as they got back to their feet. One, two, three. One was missing. There was a distinct lack of blue on the platform, and just over the edge was the ugly green glow of the ghost that had attacked them.

They approached the edge together, slowly with weapons raised. The light from the ghost was still there, but there was only one person laying on the ground below.

He kept struggling and thrashing in little jerky movements. Cole felt like his stomach was turning itself inside out, but he edged closer. “Jay?” He jumped a little when Kai latched onto his sleeve.

Jay stopped moving suddenly, and to Cole’s dismay the green light didn’t fade away. The ghost was still here. There was nothing they could do. Cole took a step back and Kai went with him, still attached to his arm.

“I’m scared,” Kai whimpered.

Cole could only nod.

All three of them jumped and Cole absolutely did _not_ let out an embarrassing scream when the ghost’s hand suddenly appeared on the edge of the platform. He started to pull himself up to his feet.

“Jay…?”

He kept jerking his movements just a tiny bit as he turned to face them. The boy they were looking at now was definitely not Jay. His hair was black and fell down messily around his face, making his skin look, for lack of better words, ghostly. Somehow the possession had managed to morph his clothes as well, combining the blue gi with the faded and torn clothes of the ghost. Thick chains were wrapped loosely around his waist and over one shoulder. He turned to look at them and Cole took another step back. It was all so reminiscent of Lloyd when they’d last seen him.

His eyes were green, bright blinding green like a neon light, nothing even close to natural. When he saw the ninja he grinned darkly and hopped back onto the platform.

Zane was the only one thinking straight, rushing for the discarded chain weapon and grabbing it away before the ghost could reach it. He held up his sword in his other hand. “Let him go.”

The ghost stumbled a little as he took a few steps toward Zane. It was like he had to consciously think about every movement he was making. He stopped, still smiling at them in a way Cole didn’t think was possible on Jay’s face. “Give me the chain, boy.”

Hearing his voice, Kai gripped tighter and Cole felt the sick feeling rising up to his chest. That was the ghost’s voice, mostly. But not entirely. He could still just barely hear Jay in there. _Fight him, Jay. Fight back._

“Only when you give us our friend.”

The ghost paused, then began laughing so hard he nearly fell over. The sound of it made Cole feel like he was being suffocated. And he thought that thing’s voice was grating when it was just talking. Its laughter was a whole new realm of raspy and screechy pain. “You think a mere _weapon_ is worth a _human vessel_?”

He took another step closer, a little off-balance but managing not to look like an idiot. In fact, the staggering and jerky movements actually made him all the more terrifying, like something out of a horror movie.

Zane stood his ground. “I’m sure this chain means something to you.”

“Something?! Sure, but it’s not _enough_ .” He laughed again. “Are you _really_ willing to hurt your dear buddy over a stupid chain?”

“You seem willing enough to continue to threaten us for it.”

The ghost stopped smiling, instead pausing to glare at Zane. He glanced at Cole and Kai as well, and Cole held up his sword in response. Whatever this thing was, it wasn’t Jay anymore. Kai held his arm even tighter.

Zane spoke up again, voice unwavering. “Leave him alone and you get your weapon back. Isn’t that simple enough for you?”

He glared at Zane again, holding the gaze only for a second before growling. “Fine! I don’t have a shortage of weapons, you know!” The ghost pulled his tattered cape around himself dramatically, and in a burst of green smoke he disappeared.

Cole let his breath release, though Kai still held tightly to his arm. Zane lowered his sword and dropped the chain.

“W-well.” Cole cleared his throat and tried to steady his voice. “That looked like a cheesy movie villain exit. Do you think all ghosts are this extra?”

“THAT’S what you’re thinking about right now?!” Kai screamed in his ear.

“What else am I supposed to say? _Oh no, another one of our friends was taken!_ What do you expect from me? _Someone_ had to say _something_ and that was all I could think of!”

Kai was about to reply, but Zane stepped between them and managed to pry him from Cole’s arm, shoving them apart before any more arguments could be thrown around.

“We are down two ninja and your bickering isn’t going to make a difference. All we can do now is move forward.”

“And where is that?” Cole got to his feet and put his sword away. “We just keep on trekking to Stiix and then what? Another one of us gets taken? We keep running and we keep fighting and we keep pushing forward until there’s only one ninja left?”

“If that’s what it takes.”

“No!” Cole felt like screaming now too. These weren’t ordinary people being stolen from them. These were their _friends_ . It was Lloyd and Jay. They were _gone_. How could Zane not understand this? “I’m not about to lose anyone else! We have to find a way to stop them. There’s got to be some weakness those ghosts have and we have to find it. We have to get them back.”

Kai kept nodding so enthusiastically Cole was sure his hair was going to stab someone in the face. “He’s right, we can’t just leave them like this!”

“We have no choice. The only way we’re going to get ahead of them long enough to do something worthwhile is if we get to Stiix before Morro does. We get the scroll, we find the next clues, we find the tomb. Morro will be stopped and we’ll get Lloyd and Jay back. But for now we just have to keep moving.” He stood up, pulling Kai up with him. “The tracks lead to Stiix, remember? We can catch up with the train that just went past and rest a while until it gets there.”

Cole was about to say something else, but Zane had already jumped off the platform and was running down the tracks to catch up with the train. Kai got up to follow him, and Cole sighed and decided it wasn’t worth it to keep fighting. For now he had to run.

“Never thought I’d find you way out here, Morro.”

Morro slumped down next to him in the grass, exhaustion on all his features, though it was probably mostly exhaustion from the human he was possessing. “When I got to the library, I found out the scroll was stolen by an infamous thief called Ronin. It took some digging, but I finally found out that he makes his hideout here in Stiix.”

Wrayth felt himself slipping and shook his head, accidentally jerking his arms in the process. He groaned quietly and hoped Morro hadn’t noticed his weird behavior. This possession thing was harder than he thought. A few hours had passed and still the ninja refused to give up.

Morro laughed and turned to face him. “You seem uncomfortable.”

Damn, he did notice. “I’m fine. Just getting used to this...this new body.”

“Yeah, it takes a while for them to stop fighting. Lloyd’s still trying to fight back. It’s kind of exhausting, actually.”

“You make it look so easy. This kid won’t get tired.”

Morro sighed and sat with his legs over the edge of the cliff. It dropped straight down into the ocean, their view overlooking a shabby little town built on docks. Water was the one thing that could hurt them, could vanquish them from these human bodies and send them back to the Cursed Realm. But Morro had never been afraid of anything, or at least that was what he always said to make himself look tough. “You took the blue one, didn’t you? Jay?”

“You know their names?” Wrayth felt himself jerking again as he sat down too.

“Lloyd’s refusal to get out of my head is proving useful in some ways. I have full access to his memories and his thoughts. Unfortunately it means he can access mine too, but soon it won’t really matter what he knows about me. Right now it means I know all his friends’ names, all his hiding places. The best part is I know what really scares him. I might have to tap into that later, but for now we just need time to rest.” He sighed and laid back. “I find that the longer I keep him awake, the more tired he gets. I almost forgot that mortals _need_ to sleep. Keep him fighting during the first few days, and he’ll get worn out pretty quick.”

Wrayth laid next to him and stared up at the stars. The mortal realm really was quite pretty, especially away from all the big cities where— Wait, what was he thinking? He’d never seen a big city. This was always how the sky looked when he’d lived here. He wanted to hit himself for letting the ninja try to fight him again. However, he did have to admit he missed the night sky after only seeing the inside of the cursed realm for so many centuries, or however long it had been. “Yeah, well I’m getting worn out too. Isn’t there a faster way to get him to shut up?”

“Not that I know of. Just give it time. We’ll need our strength if we’re going to get that scroll away from Ronin. Before we go I might summon a bit more help.”

“Who do you have in mind?” Wrayth knew Morro too well. Neither of them had that many friends back in the cursed realm. Morro was so bratty and stubborn that even the other ghosts didn’t like him. Wrayth was only close with him because they had both been misfits, outcasts in the land of the cursed.

“I’ve heard of this Ronin guy before. He’s racked up a lot of debt with the Soul Archer, so that’s someone who would be willing to help us.”

Soul Archer. Yeah, he’d trust Morro pretty far. The Archer was like their weird uncle who always went off and did creepy stuff, and somehow had escaped to the mortal realm a few times and got random mortals into heaps of trouble. Ronin must be the most recent one.

“What about the other two symbols on the staff?”

“I haven’t figured that out yet. But the Archer can help, and if he can’t figure it out I can call a few more friends.”

“Morro, you have to be smart with that armor. It’s wearing you out, so you can’t just call people whenever you feel like it.”

“I’m being smart!” Morro sat up, a terrible look on his face. Wrayth felt himself starting to twitch again. “Bansha knows all sorts of history shit! She’ll know what the riddles mean. And I’m thinking of bringing out Ghoultar too, just for extra muscle in case we run into the ninja again. I know what I’m doing, Wrayth.”

“Don’t get me wrong, I trust you.” Another twitch. Wrayth sunk deeper into the grass and hoped it wasn’t too obvious. _Stop fighting back, you stupid ninja. Just give up already, I’m not letting go._ “I just don’t want you to hurt yourself, that’s all.”

Morro kept glaring for a few seconds. Finally he sighed and laid back down. “I’m fine. Everything’s fine. There’s no one else who would follow me through this, even if the Preeminent herself told them to. It’ll really be just the five of us. And you know the best part?”

“What?”

“Five ninja. Five of us. We could take them all down and then getting the crystal won’t be a problem.”

Wrayth laughed. “Good luck getting Bansha to possess a teenage boy.”

This night just dragged on and on, didn’t it? Blade met chain again with a painful clang, bright ghostly green cutting through the darkness of the night. Cole stumbled back and managed to catch sight of two red and white specks disappearing over another rooftop in the distance before the glowing chain came at him again.

“I told you I had more weapons,” the ghost sneered. He was close, leaning in closer. The eyes and the voice and the sickly pale of his skin were unsettling as they were, but on Jay’s features, on his best friend. Terrifying.

“I believed you,” was all Cole could say.

The ghost laughed, pressing closer like he wasn’t afraid of the aeroblade Cole held between them. Or maybe like he knew Cole wouldn’t be able to hurt him even with deepstone, not if it meant hurting Jay.

Cole was starting to wish he hadn’t stayed back alone. It wouldn’t be so bad to deal with this if one of the others was here. Even Zane talking backwards would have been more comforting than annoying. Then again, at this point he was just another reminder of who might have been able to fix the vocal problem, if he hadn’t been taken from them. Damn it, this day had been so _hard_. They’d been lucky to find Ronin with only half the team, then just as unlucky not to find the scroll. Then Morro showed up just as they were getting close, and of course he brought friends. Another ghost, not just the one that had taken Jay, was floating around somewhere in this town. Hopefully he wouldn’t catch up to Zane and Kai, but that was wishful thinking at this point.

The chain came lashing at him again, and Cole managed to hook one of the pointed ends of the aeroblade in between the links and he pulled. At this point he wasn’t sure if he could call it luck or subconscious skill that he’d managed to drag the ghost out of the center of town, toward the fishing docks. Whatever it was, he could work with it. The ghost startled when he realized where they were, and barely caught himself before being thrown over the edge into the sea.

He held onto a post on the edge of the dock for dear life, and for a moment as Cole stood over him, he looked just a little more like Jay. But the flicker of fear didn’t last long before it morphed back into wicked anger.

“You think you’re so smart, huh?” the ghost taunted. He stayed down low, barely any intention of pulling himself fully back onto the dock. “So you’ve figured it out, have you?”

“That water is the only way to get rid of you creeps?” Cole spat. “Yeah, no thanks to you.” Thanks, actually, to a phone call with Nya this morning to update her and Wu on their progress. She’d replied with progress of her own, training to be a water ninja, and a promise that she’d do her best to unlock her powers soon so she could jump in and help.

“So you feel safe here, don’t you?” the ghost said, smiling as wide and creepily as ever. What Cole would give to be able to wipe it off his face without hurting his friend in the process. “You think we can be stopped just by pushing us into the sea? As long as Morro has that armor, we can come back whenever we want!”

 _But you won’t have Jay anymore_ , was what Cole was about to say. Before he could get any of the words out, however, the ghost hurled himself back up onto the dock with a strength Cole didn’t expect from him, grabbing his chain in the process and pinning Cole down. The aeroblade had slipped from his hand, now just barely out of reach.

The ghost grinned down at him, holding the chain against his neck. “Good thing I don’t have to worry about that quite yet. And I suppose _you_ don’t have to worry about your friend drowning once we’re separated. Looks like a win-win, hm?”

“He can swim.”

“Not without my strength, he can’t.” The ghost tutted and shook his head. “Do you know how long I’ve been awake with him pounding in my skull? I can feel how worn out he is by now. He wouldn’t last a second in the water.”

So Jay was still in there. And he was still fighting. Or had been, at least. Cole refused to believe he would stop so soon. It had only been a day.

He tried to move, but the ghost was either deceptively strong or deceptively heavy and wouldn’t budge.

A voice called out from above them. “Wrayth! Come on, we’re leaving.”

The ghost pouted, sitting up and letting his chain fall away but it wasn’t quite enough for Cole to wiggle free. “I’m not done yet!”

“Then I’ll leave you behind, idiot. Come on, the Archer has already taken a body. Let’s go.”

“Fine,” the ghost groaned. He turned back to face Cole again as Morro’s dragon came about and started swooping down in their direction. “Until next time then, ninja. I’ll have my fun.”

Then with the cry of a dragon painfully close and a rush of air and a wingbeat that nearly slapped Cole across the face, the weight off his chest was gone and the night was dark again without the sharp glow of a ghost’s eyes staring at him.

He stayed where he was for a moment, on his back staring up at the stars, trying to blink away the vision of the ghost’s face that was burned into the back of his eyelids.

 _The Archer has already taken a body._ He didn’t want to think about what that meant. But three ghosts meant they could only take three ninja. There was still one person Cole could rely on somewhere in this town. He was just terrified to find out who it was, because he didn’t want to think about either of them being taken.

Eventually he pulled himself back up to his feet, thankful that the ghosts hadn’t been interested in taking his new weapon. Whoever was still here, he had to go find them.

Kai stared into the water, and his murky reflection stared back at him. Another stem of strangleweed crept up the side of the post he was barely clinging onto, and he wondered how terrible it would be to just let go and let it drag him down.

Okay, actually, yes it would be awful. But it wasn’t like he had anywhere to go now that he’d followed Morro all the way out here, and especially now that the ghost had taken the scroll of airjitzu, aka the only thing that probably could have gotten Kai back to Stiix safely.

In hindsight, this had been a really stupid plan.

He wished, not for the first and definitely not the last time, that he had his fire so he could just burn the weeds away and fly back to town on his dragon. And even though he knew good and well that fire wouldn’t do much against a ghost, definitely nothing like the damage water could do, he would still gladly fly after them and at least give them a light show they wouldn’t forget. Ghosts had to have been alive at one point, right? There was probably some deeply-instilled fear of flames that they still had. Maybe.

Well, it didn’t matter anyway, because he didn’t have his powers and these weird plants were way stronger than he was, and while Kai was running out of energy to keep himself rooted to the dock post, the weeds weren’t letting up at all. He was too far out here for even Cole to help him now.

And then, a light.

And a voice.

“Need a lift?”

Kai looked up at the airship hovering just a few feet out of reach. “Why do you think I would trust you?”

Ronin glared right back. “Because you’re alone out here and I don’t see either of your friends coming to save you, kiddo. Now do you want help or not?”

“Just get me out of here.”

Why he expected the ship to come closer, Kai wasn’t sure. But Ronin kept it right where it was. “Nothing in life is free,” he said.

“You slimy, money-grubbing— We’ve been over this! I don’t even have pockets! What do you even want from me?”

Ronin laughed. “Your loss.” He went back up to the cockpit, hit a few buttons. The ship started to fly away.

Damn it.

“Wait!” Kai called before it could get too far. “There is something! Get back here!”

The ship backed up. It hadn’t really gotten far away to begin with, and Kai tried not to get his hopes up that maybe, somewhere deep down, Ronin _wanted_ to help. It was more likely that the crook just wanted to take advantage of Kai’s situation. Yeah, that was it.

Ronin stopped right where he was before, still out of reach, and poked his head back out the door. “Keep talking.”

Ugh, would he just get the rescue part over with already and _then_ talk money? Kai was getting really tired down here. “A tea farm. Small business.” A weed caught his arm but he pulled free before it could drag him down. “Wu said that we each got a share of the business. You can have mine.”

The airship didn’t move. “I said keep talking.”

“What?” Another weed pulled his ankle. “You’re crazy! Just help me!”

“If I can’t be convinced, I’m not going to waste my time on you.”

“Okay, okay! All of them! Everyone’s!”

Ronin’s face cracked in a dark grin. “How much of the business is that then? Fifty percent? Seventy-five?”

He expected Kai to do _math_ while he was trying not to _die_ down here? After everything else that had happened tonight? “I don’t know!” Five ninja out of, what? Them and Wu, probably Nya and Misako. Ugh, math was hard already without freak mutant seaweed dragging him closer and closer to impending death. “It’s a lot, dude! And it’s all I can give you, okay? Please just help me!”

“Good enough, I suppose,” Ronin said with a dramatic sigh. But he lowered the airship and leaned out the open doorway to cut the strangleweed away and pulled Kai into the ship. “I’ll need the coordinates so I can scope the place out.”

Kai nodded and flopped back on the floor, breathing heavily. He was not admitting that little defeat to anyone. “Fine. Whatever you say. Just get me back to Stiix.”

Cole was waiting when Ronin finally let the ladder down so Kai could be back on dry land. Er. Dry dock. Still, the sooner he wasn’t directly over water, the better.

Wait. Cole was waiting. Just Cole. No one else.

Kai shook his head, not wanting to remember what happened in the alley after they left him behind to deal with the ghost that had possessed Jay. Morro had been in their sights, just out of their grasp. Then when they rounded a corner they nearly ran headfirst into the other ghost that must have been lying in wait for them. The Soul Archer, Ronin had called it. It seemed like a fair enough aim, since the guy was armed with a bow with a glowing string in one hand, and was pulling back the arrow attached to it in the other. When he’d pulled it all the way back, the arrowhead morphed into a disgustingly distorted face that let out an equally distorted screech.

_“I suggest you boys lower those blades, and you turn around and go home.”_

_“We’re not going anywhere.”_

_“.rehcrA eht htiw laed dna kcab yats ll’I .orroM wollof ,iaK”_

Right. Because Zane was talking backwards. But there was something about his tone and the flicker in his mechanical eyes, and Kai had a feeling he understood what had been said. He hoped he understood correctly.

The message was pretty much confirmed when Zane rushed for the Archer, knocking the arrow out of the way before a shot could be fired. It opened up a perfect gap for Kai to run through, so he took the opportunity and kept chasing, too afraid to look back at the fight breaking out behind him. All he could focus on was getting Morro.

When he touched back down on the docks, Ronin said something to catch his attention and pull him back out of the reverie. “I’m gonna hold you to that deal.”

Kai nodded, almost forgetting their conversation from barely five minutes ago. “They’re yours. Just go.”

“Kai!” Cole reached him almost before Ronin was gone, and pulled him into a big bear hug. “Zane is gone.”

The words echoed in Kai’s head for a few seconds. Maybe a few minutes. Maybe the rest of the night. When he opened his mouth to respond, he wasn’t even sure he knew what he was saying. He was just on autopilot now. “I know.”

“Are you okay?”

Kai shook his head. He realized he wasn’t hugging back, and made a weak effort to return the sentiment. “It’s just us.”

“We’ll have Nya soon.” Cole took a shaky breath. He didn’t let go.

“We have to get the scroll first.”

He felt Cole shudder. “We have to chase them down, don’t we?”

Oh. Wait. “Actually, Ronin gave me a tip. The scroll was in the library, but apparently Yang’s old temple is like a historical landmark. Stories say it’s haunted.”

Cole pulled back, fear hanging in his eyes. “You’re telling me we have to choose between going after Morro to get the scroll, or facing the literal ghost of Yang inside a creepy haunted temple?”

Kai nodded. “At least the haunted temple isn’t actively trying to kill us.”

“Small comforts. But you’re not wrong.”

“And we know where it is.”

“Please stop being right.”

They were down three now. But maybe with Nya on their side, they could even the score again. Maybe they could even tip the scales once she mastered her water powers.

The sickly green light was starting to fade. Was this it? Was he really giving up now? Or maybe all the fighting was paying off. He didn’t remember feeling ready to give up yet, even though he was tired and sore, if it was possible to be tired and sore when he was trapped in his own mind.

“Let the humans rest. Our work will be much harder if they give out on us now.”

“What about the nindroid?”

“Not him. The Soul Archer needs more time to wear him out like we did.”

The darkness was getting light again. The same nasty green light. But the world around him wasn’t empty anymore. In fact it felt so horribly real and solid that the sudden act of existing in it made him feel even sicker than before. Jay managed to open his eyes and saw that the ghost had finally left his body and was hovering over him, though it was only there for a moment before it flashed him a menacing grin and left. A few other ghosts were floating not far away, talking about something that might have been important, but Jay was too exhausted to try and listen.

He tried his best to get up but didn’t get very far. Apparently ghosts had an unlimited store of energy that he couldn’t compete with. If he thought he’d been sore in the ghostly possession void of his own mind, this felt like death. Every muscle in his body ached like he’d tried to lift something a thousand times his size, and his head was throbbing so much he could barely stand to keep his eyes open let alone sit up vertically. Instead he managed to find a wall somewhere behind him and pulled himself up to lean against it so he didn’t feel entirely useless.

The wall at his back felt rough and poked out in odd places. Stone, maybe the wall of a cave. It didn’t look familiar. The ghosts were giving off their own eerie light, and the fact that the fire was green didn’t help his sick feeling. He ignored the pounding in every inch of his skull and tried to look around and see more, but was quickly distracted by a lump of green folded up beside him.

“Lloyd.” Oh gosh was that his own voice? Jay didn’t think he even sounded like himself. It was a wonder his voice was physically able to get this deep. Yikes.

The green ninja seemed to be awake. At any rate he responded halfheartedly when Jay said his name.

“Lloyd, are you okay?” Yup. His own voice. Rough and scratchy and now that he was aware of it, his throat hurt too.

Lloyd sounded just as pained as Jay felt. Maybe even moreso. “Not really.”

“They’re saying stuff over there,” Jay said. “It sounds important.”

Lloyd took a deep breath and pushed himself up to sit against the wall as well. “Can you hear them?” He quickly lost the strength to stay upright and slumped over, landing painfully on Jay’s shoulder and apologizing softly when Jay whimpered.

“No,” Jay said through gritted teeth. If he was in pain, he couldn’t imagine what Lloyd must be feeling. Time was elusive, but Lloyd had been taken at least a day before Jay had. A day? Just one? And it had been only a day since Jay was taken as well. These ghosts might be the death of them. “I don’t think I have the energy to get up and do anything about it, though.”

“Me neither.” Another deep breath. Lloyd’s weight grew heavier, but also somehow more comforting. “Tell me that’s not Zane I’m seeing over there.”

Oh hell. Yeah it was. “It is,” Jay said, eyeing the spooky glow that had replaced all Zane’s little lights and switches. Apparently it was possible for robots to be possessed too. “Do you...can you remember anything from when Morro was possessing you?”

Lloyd groaned, closing his eyes. “Yeah. Everything. I wish I didn’t.”

“Same.” Like a movie playing out in his head, except it wasn’t even an out-of-body experience. He could feel every move the ghost was forcing him to make, every cheesy and overly dramatic flourish of the stupid cape, every swing of his glowing ghost chain, every attack he made on his own friends that he’d been helpless to stop.

Wrayth had been lucky to get away without a fight that first night. Back when Jay was still holding on and still a little bit in control of his body. They might not have lasted long against the other three. But time had sapped Jay’s energy and now Wrayth was just out there throwing metal around and attacking Cole on the docks. He shuddered at the memory, enough to jostle Lloyd.

“Ow.”

“Sorry.”

“Jay, are you alright?”

A deep breath. “No.”

He waited, but Lloyd didn’t say anything back. For a moment it was just noises from the ghosts, something about deciphering the second clue, something about taking a few more... _vessels_. That didn’t sound good, but at the same time it didn’t quite sound like the Archer was alluding to human vessels, so maybe the other ninja were in the clear for now.

“Jay?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m really scared. I don’t know what’s going to happen to any of us. We keep being caught unawares and...and this keeps happening. How many of us are they going to take?”

Jay counted the ghosts around the fire. One, two, three, wait three...no four. He sighed. There were a lot of them and their weird glows kept mingling with each other. The floating thing wasn’t helping much either, nor was the incessant throbbing in his head that wasn’t going away. “All of us, probably. If they can.”

Lloyd somehow managed a weak laugh. “Always the optimist, aren’t you?”

“Hey, just because I’m the comic relief character doesn’t mean I’m always looking on the bright side, buddy. Sometimes that’s what makes something funny, you know? Exaggerating how horribly wrong everything could go. I mean, you laughed.”

“You’re defending your place as a side character.”

“Yes,” Jay said. “You’ve saved the day how many times now? You don’t get to talk about being a side character.”

He could hear the smile in Lloyd’s voice, even if he was too tired to turn and see it. “I guess you’ve got a point there. I don’t think I’ll be saving the day this time, though.”

Jay hummed to himself. “I think you’re right. I guess I’ll have to do it.”

Another quiet laugh. “Okay. Good luck with that.”

“Just wait. One of these days I’ll save the day and it will be the coolest thing ever. Everyone will be like, wow Jay is so cool he’s the coolest ninja and he deserves all our love and attention, wow.”

“Wow,” Lloyd echoed.

“Yes, precisely like that. With exactly that much enthusiasm. I’m glad I’ll at least have one supporter in the Jay Saves The Day Agenda.”

“I’ll definitely support you.” Lloyd cut himself off with a yawn. “After a really long nap.”

“Yeah,” Jay agreed. He felt a yawn coming on as well, and it was really a testament to how exhausted he was that he wasn’t entirely sure if he even had the energy to let the yawn happen. He’d used up whatever brain power he had left on trying to make Lloyd smile. It had been worth it. “Do you think if we stay awake, our bodies will just like. Break down, and the ghosts won’t be able to use us anymore?”

Lloyd made a pained noise that probably would have sounded indignant if he wasn’t half asleep. “That’s morbid.”

“But valid, right?”

“A little.” Another yawn. “I don’t think I can bring myself to do it, though. Too tired.”

Well, Jay couldn’t argue with that. Plus, he did prefer to stay alive long enough to help fight them off whenever that time came. It would always come down to that in the end, that was how these things worked. Friends were taken, used sometimes, but whoever was left would always come and rescue them. Cole and Kai and Nya would come back for them. They just had to hold out until then.

“Don’t stop fighting, Lloyd,” Jay said as sleep dragged him down. “When they take over again, don’t stop.”

“I won’t. I promise I won’t. I’ll be right there with you.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello I have returned with the ghost fic (blushing emoji) sorry it took so long ;; I realized I'm not so good at writing action scenes but I did my best!!
> 
> also I have fandom social media again! check the end notes for the links~
> 
> enjoy!!!

Keeping the  _ Bounty _ so high in the air while the guys were practicing airjitzu was probably not the greatest plan, but at this point Nya wasn’t about to question Wu’s judgement. She was just thankful for a break from her own training.

When Ronin showed up a few days ago, he’d told them about Kai’s deal for the store first and foremost, but eventually told them that the ninja had a second chance to get the scroll since they’d failed to acquire it from him. Something about a haunted temple, which didn’t sound too optimistic with a certain earth ninja being so scared of ghosts that he refused to go on the cheesy haunted house rides at theme parks. But communication came soon enough that they’d gotten the scroll, and while Cole and Kai were both shaken up by the experience, neither of them were hurt.

_ “And most importantly,” _ Cole had added, still sounding a little terrified,  _ “no one turned into a ghost.” _

_ “What’s that supposed to mean?” _

Kai had laughed.  _ “There’s a rumor that anyone who spends the night and doesn’t get out before sunrise will be turned into a ghost.” _

_ “Yeah, and it was just a  _ ‘rumor’ _ that the temple was haunted, and that one turned out to be true! I didn’t want to stick around in there any longer than we had to anyway, but I’m definitely glad we didn’t have to find out if the sunrise thing was real or not.” _

It was Kai’s turn for airjitzu now. Up he went, almost touching the flag at the top of the mast. Ronin laughed as Kai fell to the deck with a loud thud. Cole was trying to hold back a giggle too. Nya smiled to herself and made her way down from the bridge to join them.

Cole rolled his eyes as Kai started complaining rather vocally but also rather predictably. “Nya, how’s your training going?” he asked when she was next to him.

“Better.” When she focused she could see little droplets of water forming at her fingertips. “A little better. Not much.”

He smiled and nudged her shoulder. “Better than I could do.”

“Maybe it’s because you’re the master of earth and not water.”

He laughed. “True. But you’re also under a lot more pressure than we were. I mean, Wu is practically hovering over you at every second from what I’ve seen, but with us he basically just told us to keep training and then peaced out. It wasn’t like I was even  _ trying  _ to master anything when my power finally came to me, I was just trying to protect my dad. And I definitely wasn’t going up against an army of something that could  _ only _ be defeated by earth powers.”

“Yeah, thanks for the reminder.”

“Don’t worry. We’ve got your back.”

Kai slammed to the deck again and groaned.

“Just short!” Ronin called from the top of the mast with another laugh. “Like your temper, Kai!”

“That’s it! I give up!” Kai rolled over and laid on his back. “I’m done.”

“How’s your airjitzu, Cole?” Nya asked, ignoring her brother’s little temper tantrum in addition to all the anxiety she had about her powers.

Cole, an angel really, gave up the elemental talk and took his chance at a challenge. “Better than Kai’s, I’m sure.” He took a few steps forward and took another stab at it. He didn’t get quite as close to the flag as Kai had, but at least he had the grace to land on his feet instead of his face.

Kai sat up and folded his arms. “I was higher.”

“Landing is an important part too, you know.” Cole tried again. Closer. Another solid landing. “Just try to steady yourself when you start falling.”

They kept at it. Over and over and over again, with a lot of bickering, mostly Ronin trying to provoke them. They asked once if Nya wanted to join in and she told them she hadn’t even tried regular spinjitzu yet. Maybe later. Then they were off again. Kai eventually touched the flag and would have bragged about hitting it before Cole, except that he messed up the landing again and nearly broke his wrist when he slammed back onto the deck.

Nya wanted to ask why they didn’t talk about the others. Of course they had all seen Morro with Lloyd. None of them had been there when it first happened, but they saw the results. But when four ninja left to get answers and get help and get powered up, and only two came back, it wasn’t unreasonable for anyone to have questions. Cole and Kai hadn’t said much when she asked what happened. Only that Jay and Zane had been taken, and there wasn’t any use trying to get them back. They only had to treat the situation like they had with Lloyd: keep pushing forward, find the tomb, stop the ghosts, then everything would be fine again.

It was almost midday when Misako came up to the main deck to tell them she’d figured out the second clue. The sword represented one of many sacred swords that were all supposed to be super mysterious and had fancy powers. The clouds meant that it was held in the Cloud Kingdom, a parallel realm that had only one entrance from Ninjago. Now that they knew where it was, they could set the coordinates and began the flight.

Nya went back out to the main deck when the meeting was over to practice her powers a bit more. Morro had already stolen one of her samurai mechs and even though she’d tried to fight them off, all she had managed to do was destroy the allied armor. So, yeah, she was a bit more motivated now to keep working on this water thing.

Now that she thought back, a couple of the ghosts had looked familiar. But she didn’t want to think about that either. Knowing that so many of her friends had been there and that she could have saved them was too much of a burden. She should have worked harder before to master her power. Maybe she could have finished it then in the samurai cave.

She expected the others to join her on deck, but no one did. They all must have decided to spend their time waiting elsewhere, probably avoiding getting splashed in the off chance that she actually managed to summon anything. She got used to the quiet and the calm and the cold air, and even managed to make a tiny ball of water that she silently moved in aimless patterns all around the deck.

When she suddenly heard a voice behind her, she accidentally flung the water back toward the voice. Realizing what she’d done, she felt her whole body cringe as she turned around. “Sorry, you scared me. I didn’t know you were there.”

It was Kai. And one side of his uniform was now soaking wet. But he smiled and put his hand on her shoulder. “It’s fine. I’m actually proud of you for being able to conjure this much. You do better when no one’s watching, huh?”

Nya sighed. “Tell that to Wu.”

“Um...speaking of the old man.” Kai looked away from her. “He wanted me to tell you not to come with us to the Cloud Kingdom.”

She paused. “What?! I  _ have _ to come with you guys! There’s only two of you and a bunch of them!” And she could help. Even if she was with them for a few seconds, it was all she needed to summon just a bit of water, just enough to banish the ghosts and get Jay and Zane and Lloyd back.

“It’s not that I agree with him!” He sighed. “I want you with us, and Cole does too. Truth is, we’re terrified and we could use all the help we can get. But Wu said you’re still not ready.”

“That’s not fair!” Nya felt like screaming. It wasn’t fair at all. Even if the water thing didn’t work, she still knew how to fight. She could use her new aeroblade. So what if it wasn’t water? It killed ghosts, and that was all that mattered. “What if something happens? I’ve seen them, Kai. He’s got more with him. I know I blew up the armor but he still has ghosts with him that he could use on you the way he did with — with them.”

“You’ve seen them?”

She froze. But Kai was looking at her with wide eyes, someone who was scared and worried and didn’t want to be alone. Nya let out a breath and felt her shoulders drop. “I tried to sneak away from training one night to get my samurai mech and come help you guys. When I got there, Morro was there with some of his ghosts. There were four of them with him. I tried to attack them and I managed to destroy the allied armor, but they got away with the mech.”

“Jay and Zane were there?”

Nya closed her eyes tightly. She didn’t want to think about it. But she nodded anyway, because those two had felt familiar, and she vividly remembered wondering why a ghost looked so...metallic.

“H-how did they look?”

She opened her eyes and looked up at Kai. “Like ghosts. I don’t know. I barely processed who they were. Everything happened so fast, Ronin and I were lucky to get out of there.”

“Right.” He got quiet.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. They’re your friends too. We’ll get this dumb sword and get them back. Everything is going to be fine.”

She had a feeling he was talking to himself more than her.

“I’m  _ going _ on this mission.”

Cole took a step back, pulling Kai with him. He was pretty sure they’d said Nya was the master of water, but she’d always been just as fiery as her brother.

Wu stood his ground, as he had against the boys when they were younger. “You’re not ready yet.”

Nya looked over at the two of them, pleading. “Guys, a little help?”

“We could use an extra person,” Kai said quietly.

Cole nodded. “We’re down by three, and Nya is the only one that could potentially help get them back right now.” He could see Wu about to respond, but he wasn’t about to take no for an answer. Not now, after everything. “When the four of us found our full potential, we weren’t  _ trying  _ to find it. There was always something else we were focused on. Giant tree monsters, a roller coaster, falling stage equipment, a volcano. She’s not any different. Just give her a chance out there with us and it might help everyone. Even without elemental power, she’s just as much of a threat to them as we are.”

Absolute silence.

They knew he was right.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity of wasted time, Wu shook his head slowly, like he was disappointed in himself for not thinking of that earlier, or maybe disappointed that one of his students had bested him. “Okay.”

Nya gasped. “Really?”

Wu nodded, saying nothing else as he left the hangar where they kept the mechs.

“Did he just—?” Nya started.

“Don’t question it too much, or he’ll change his mind,” Cole said, patting her on the shoulder. He knew he’d made some good points, but it was best not to push harder than necessary. “Come on, we’re on a time crunch. You can take the titanium mech if you want. I know you worked hard on it.”

Nya turned to look at one of the mechs on the far wall. There was room in the hangar for four: the one she’d made for Kai years ago, the one Cole had stolen from the nindroids, the one Jay had stolen from Chen. Zane didn’t have one, so all the tech nerds of their group decided to make him one, though he hadn’t gotten the chance to use it yet. “Feels wrong.”

“Well, it’s either that or the lightning mech,” Kai said. “They stole your samurai one for a reason.”

“Yeah, we’re not making it up this mountain without them.”

“I know.” Nya sighed. “Okay, okay. I’ll take Zane’s. But I’m giving it back to him as soon as he’s free from the ghost.”

“I guess we’ll have to figure out those logistics when we get there.”

The air was so cold, Kai could hardly breathe. At least two (okay,  _ only  _ two) other people informed him that it was because they were so high up and the air was just thin, but he was convinced it was the cold. Even bundled up in thick coats with heavily-armored gis underneath, the biting wind on the mountain felt like it was going to freeze his nose off.

They’d been climbing for hours. Not even that it felt like hours because the trip was so exhausting and frigid, but they’d actually been climbing for literal hours. The  _ Bounty _ could only take them so high, and Wu had said something about the next contact with the Blind Man’s Eye being four hours away and how that would be just enough time to scale the mountain as long as they didn’t run into too much trouble.

Not too much trouble, hah.

Okay, so they hadn’t run into much yet. A few of the shrieking wind gusts had threatened to wipe them off the mountain, but the mechs did their jobs and held firm, and so far there had been no sign of Morro or his crew.

“Sorry this first ninja mission is so boring, Nya,” Kai said before he could lose his mind.

She laughed, and he could barely hear her voice crackling through the intercom system. The harsher gusts were what threatened to kill them, but there was always a steady and less lethal breeze flowing between the peaks. It made conversation a bit difficult. “It’s not bad, actually. Anything away from training is nice. You know, fresh air. Team building.”

“I’m glad one of us can be optimistic.”

“It’s what they’d want from us, right?” Cole said, somewhere ahead of them. “They’re waiting for us to get to them. We can’t just sit around and be depressed all the time.”

“Yeah,” Nya agreed. “And we will get to them. Those tracks back there were from my samurai mech, so we’re definitely going to cross paths with the ghosts today.”

“Yay,” Kai said with absolutely no enthusiasm. He was not looking forward to another fight, necessary as it might be. At least the ghosts would be as unfamiliar with their surroundings as the ninja were. They had a somewhat even playing field.

Conversation died down again, their focus and energy all going back to climbing and holding onto the mountain when another gust came through.

Misako had said something about an ancient temple near the highest peak, and that they would have to pass by it on their way up. When she brought it up, Kai mumbled something like  _ why on earth would there ever be a group of people who chose to live in a desolate wasteland like that _ . No one seemed to hear him, or they were content to ignore him. But the temple had been abandoned for centuries, only kept up because it was too cold up there for anything to rot away.  _ History frozen in time _ , he said. There was still no one listening. Jay would have laughed, he was sure of it. And Zane probably would have gotten to the joke first, because for some reason ice-related humor was the only kind he was capable of. Ice and sass.

They reached the temple after who knows how long, and it was not at all what Kai had expected and yet exactly what he expected at the same time. Not even the paint had chipped, almost like someone was still living there, though the place was clearly abandoned.

Well, abandoned except for a small army of ghosts armed with a samurai mech.

At first, it seemed like having three mechs gave the ninja the upper hand. They were bigger and stronger and it was easier to hold on when a wind gust came through. But they quickly found that the ghosts were far more mobile on their feet, and on such a small platform jutting out from the temple, there wasn’t enough room for four mechs to battle it out. Painful as it was for Kai to watch his mech fall into a cloudy abyss below, he’d been ready to get out of it for a long time.

He was yanked from his own thoughts when a sudden thud caught his shoulder, knocking him to the wooden platform outside the temple and nearly pushing him over the edge.

“Kai!” two voices shouted in unison.

He hurried to get up, clutching his shoulder and finding an arrow embedded in his armor. Shit. Well, at least the deepstone worked. “I’m okay!”

Nya got to him first, almost before he wrenched the arrow out of his armor. “You were hit!” Her eyes were wide with fear.

“I’m okay,” he said again, taking her hand to pull himself back up. “Just gonna have a nasty bruise, no big deal.”

Before they could get back into the fray, Nya wrapped her arms around him with another painful thud.

“Ow. I said I’m sore.”

“Be more careful, you idiot! I’m not losing anyone else!”

“Hey guys,” Cole called out from somewhere above them, still thundering around in his mech, “sentimentality is great, but can we save it for later?!”

“Coming!”

“Sorry.”

Kai tried not to think too much about what the Archer looked like when he jumped back into the fight. He really  _ really _ tried to be vengeful about the arrow in his shoulder when he got out his aeroblade and attacked. But there was no mistaking the glint of metal or the LED glow that had been changed from cyan to sickly green. The Archer’s voice taunted him, but there was the tiniest hint of Zane’s voice hidden in the back as well.

“Look out!”

A silver glowing aeroblade flew past, slamming into an arrow that had been meant for him. Kai watched the blade fly back to Nya. “Sorry.”

“Don’t lose focus!”

“I’m trying.”

He was trying.

There was only so much they could do, even together.

“Nya, use your water!”

“Cole! The mech!”

“Kai, pay attention!”

They were trying so hard. But there was only so much they could do when only two of the ghosts they were fighting were unfamiliar faces, and the other two were close friends. It was one thing to fling an aeroblade at the new ghost with her freakish screaming voice or the big nasty one that looked like a floating skeleton with a scythe, but impossible to send a weapon flying at Jay or Zane.

Kai couldn’t do it.

He started looking for an out. There had to be a way to escape, to just stop fighting and run. They had to somehow beat Morro up the mountain anyway before the Eye arrived. Oh gosh they had forgotten all about getting to the Cloud Kingdom!

Just past the deck of the temple was a snowy path, then just beyond that a bridge. Ghosts seemed to be affected by gravity, and could only float so high above ground or above a building. Even the two not possessing a body wouldn’t be able to follow them across that ravine if they somehow made it over that bridge and destroyed it.

Okay. Okay, he could do that.

“Cole! Nya!”

They both turned to look at him, each locked in a fight.

“We have to get to Morro!” He hoped they could catch onto his plan. There was no time to explain. Instead he just turned and ran as fast as he could for the bridge, aeroblade at the ready in case one of the disembodied ghosts came after him. If Jay or Zane followed, he didn’t know what he would do. He would cross  _ that  _ bridge when he got to it. If he got to it.

There were footsteps running behind him but he didn’t turn around, only desperately hoped that they were Cole and Nya.

He didn’t stop to look back until he was halfway over the bridge, when he heard the whip and the clank of a chain and then a yelp that sounded a lot like Cole, and a crunch as someone fell into the snow. Nya nearly ran into him when he froze, ready to dart in either direction.

Cole was on the ground, struggling to break free from the chain that had wrapped around his torso, pinning his arms to his sides. “Go!” he shouted at them, still trying to break the chains even as the four ghosts got close and closer. “Go! Get Morro!”

“Cole!” Nya started to run back for him. But Kai, on autopilot because he had to stay on autopilot or he would go back too, grabbed her arm and pulled her in the opposite direction, toward the path, toward Morro.

“There’s no time.”

“But—”

“Nya, come on.” He must have sounded unlike himself. He  _ felt _ unlike himself, like he wasn’t really controlling what he was saying. Some painfully rational part of his brain had taken over, telling him that the only way out of this yet again was to just keep chasing Morro. They had to stay ahead because staying ahead meant stopping the ghosts which meant getting everyone else back.

Somehow he must have conveyed all of that in half a second with just one look, because Nya stopped fighting and let him drag her to the other side of the bridge. Just as they made it across, an arrow pierced the stones where they had once stood, and like a flame spreading over a scrap of paper, the pale green glow enveloped the bridge. In a second it was translucent, and Kai would bet all the money he’d given to Ronin that his hand would go right through if he tried to reach for it.

He didn’t know if the ghosts without vessels could float over a ghosted bridge, but he wasn’t about to sit here and wait to find out. For now he only hoped that the ghosts would prefer staying together, and that the ones possessing Jay and Zane wouldn’t be able to cross. Nya followed him again when he pulled her back onto the path, following footsteps up the ridge that had to be Morro’s.

Before they turned a corner, Nya looked back, and Kai couldn’t resist doing the same.

On the roof of the temple, Zane — the Archer — watched them with his bow at his side. He kept watching as they rounded the corner, both too scared to look further down and see what was happening to Cole.

Laughter taunted him from all sides as the ghost’s boot crunched harder into his shoulder. Even with the armor, the angle was too painful and Cole could feel burning pain shooting up and down his arm.

“Deepstone armor, huh?” the ghost above him asked. He ignored the tiny hint of Jay’s voice that didn’t sound at all like Jay. “Looks like you guys have done your research.”

Cole didn’t give him the satisfaction of a response. They still had him face-down in the snow anyway, so talking wasn’t exactly in his best interest. He wanted to stall, to keep them distracted as long as he could before they figured out how to cross the ghosted bridge and chase after Kai and Nya. But the words weren’t coming to him just yet.

The ghost practically standing on his shoulder raised his voice. “Okay, who wants this one?”

One of the others scoffed. “If you wanted me to take a body then you should have captured the girl,” she said. Right, the one with the freakish screaming voice that could cause avalanches. Cole did not like her. He didn’t like any of them.

“I told Morro you’d say that,” said the one above him. “Looks like he’s all yours, Ghoultar.”

“What about his armor? When I shot the red one earlier, my arrow did nothing to him. They have deepstone in their clothes too.”

The one holding him down let out a long sigh. “Do you see my foot fizzling off right now?” As if to illustrate his point, he stomped down harder on Cole’s shoulder, and Cole bit his tongue to keep from screaming. He wondered if he could catch the ghost by surprise, push them off of him and break the chains and run away. But he didn’t know where he’d run to, with the bridge ahead of him fading into nothing and the  _ Bounty _ too far down the mountain for him to get there with a pack of ghosts on his tail. Plus, he realized as his heart sank to the pit of his stomach, he probably couldn’t break these chains without his powers, as much as any glimmer of optimism would have him believe that he could.

He missed the rest of the ghosts bickering about what to do with him while he’d been lost in thought, and he was brought harshly back to the present when he felt some of the deepstone armor being ripped away, leaving tears in his gi that let the frigid air touch his skin. It took too long for him to realize that the ghosts could get to him now too, and before the thought could fully form in his mind, he felt an even colder and nastier gust of wind before something like a cloudy darkness overtook his vision and he was plunged into something horribly unknown.

“Can we  _ please _ take a break here?” Nya begged for the hundredth time. She was one more plea away from just sitting down in the snow and waiting for Kai to come back and join her.

Kai huffed, a heavy cloud in the frosty air. “We can’t stop. What if they’re following us?”

“They would have caught up by now.”

He shook his head again. “We have to keep going.”

Nya growled to herself, stopping short on the path they were following. The narrow ridge had widened, and they’d spotted footsteps in the snow that were still fresh. Morro could be around any corner ahead of them and Nya was dead tired and she couldn’t stop replaying what had happened at the temple over and over again. What if she had run back? What if they’d been smarter in the fight? What if she had been stronger? What if she’d been strong enough to vanquish all of them from the beginning? Then they wouldn’t even be on this mountain, would they?

Ahead of her, Kai didn’t stop. He didn’t even seem to notice that she had fallen behind.

“I’m done.”

Oh,  _ now  _ he turned around. But his pause didn’t last long before he shook his head and kept climbing. “Fine. Give up, then. While you’re at it, go ahead and give up on your water training too. That’s your problem, isn’t it? You give up too fast because it’s not easy on the first try. That’s what Wu said. I didn’t want to believe him because I know you. But I guess I was wrong. Rescuing the others isn’t going to be easy, so if you were going to give up on me then you should have done it while you could still get back to the ship. But I’ll leave you here if you want. I don’t really feel like dragging you back down with me from the Cloud Kingdom.”

“Shut up!” Without knowing what she was doing or how she was doing it, Nya found herself flinging  _ something _ at her brother, like she’d bent down and packed up a snowball in her hand and hurled it at the back of his head. Except she hadn’t made a snowball, she didn’t have anything in her hands. And what hit Kai wasn’t an explosion of powdery snow, but a blast of water. It turned frosty when it hit his back and splashed to the ground. He was shivering when he stopped in his tracks, but she couldn’t bring herself to feel sorry for him. “I’m  _ not  _ giving up! I’m not giving up on any of them. But this...this is hard, and I’m tired, and I feel like I’m going to throw up because we just left Cole behind like that. Just — just give me a minute to process!”

Kai blinked once, twice. Then he slumped in defeat, looking like he was about ready to lay down in the snow. When he spoke again, his voice was quiet, all the fight drained from him. “I feel like if I stop, I won’t want to get back up again.”

Oh.

For a moment, neither of them moved. Wind whistled around them, not strong enough to blow them away but none too gentle either. Kai shivered again. The back of his coat was probably frozen solid by now, and Nya wished she had actually thrown a snowball instead of getting emotional and letting her powers take over. How was she supposed to control it anyway if she could only use her power when she wasn’t trying to?

She climbed up to meet him on the ridge where he’d stopped. “I’m sorry.” After the shortest hesitation, she wrapped her arms around him and pulled him tight. He hugged her back. “I didn’t realize—”

“No, I was being selfish. I should have understood if you need some time,” he said.

“But you aren’t wrong. We can’t afford to stop. I need to suck it up and keep going. We’re on a time crunch.”

Kai shivered again, more violently than before. “Yeah,” he said through chattering teeth. “Gotta catch up. And I want to get off this stupid mountain already. Do you think the Cloud Kingdom is warm?”

Nya allowed herself a little smile. “I hope so. Maybe I can help a bit, though. Since I made it worse.” She focused on the icy water clinging to Kai’s thick coat. It was starting to really freeze over, but if she closed her eyes and tried to feel it, she could coax it out so he wouldn’t be so cold.

“I would love to help if I could,” Kai said, teeth chattering, “but I can’t right now.”

“That’s okay. I’ll do my best.”

“I really am sorry. This is hard, you know? Losing everyone.”

Nya nodded. “I know. I’m sorry too.”

“They’ll be okay.”

“Yeah.”

They breathed. It was hard with the air being so thin this high up, but they breathed. Nya got most of the water back out of Kai’s coat, at least enough that he wasn’t shivering as badly anymore.

“Are you ready to keep going?” he asked, barely audible over the breeze.

“Yeah, I’m ready. Let’s go get that sword.”

_ “Morro? You’re still here?” _

_ “You were supposed to take care of ALL the ninja! How do you expect me to fight them off AND get to the top of the mountain in time, huh?” _

_ “They seemed to have a pretty easy time fighting  _ you  _ off and getting to the top of the mountain in time.” _

_ “There are TWO OF THEM!” _

_ “Well, what do we do now?” _

_ “I know people.” _

_ “What kind of people?” _

_ “People willing to leave the back door open.” _

_ “How long will that take?” _

_ “Depends on how fast they answer.” _

Much like last time they had been allowed a short rest, Lloyd couldn’t even be thankful for the break. Last time he was just too tired, his energy and his power completely drained and his head spinning too fast to even register where he was. This time it was all that and more: bitter, freezing cold.

Apparently ghosts don’t need to keep themselves warm, even when possessing human bodies.

And to be honest, he didn’t really care what said ghosts were up to right now, though he probably should have cared. They were too smart for their own good.

Instead, he huddled close to the faint warmth pressed against his back. “Two guesses to who’s behind me.”

“Zane is made of metal, I wouldn’t recommend using him as a heater right now.”

Lloyd let himself smile. “Okay, one guess to who’s behind me.”

He heard a smile in Jay’s voice too. “Master Chen.”

“I was gonna say Clouse.”

“Close enough.” A shrug. Lloyd winced when he bent his shoulder just the wrong way, and he vaguely wondered if shrugging was painful for Jay too.

“Wait,” he said, opening his eyes. Wow, it was bright out here. Maybe he’d keep them closed for now. “Did you say Zane is here too?”

“Yes.” Oh. That was Zane. Somewhere just to his left, with a crunch in the snow that said he was scooting closer to them.

Memories said that there was one more.

“And Cole?”

He felt Jay sigh. “They’re still holding onto him. Can’t you see them from where you’re at?”

“Yeah, but it’s bright.”

“Wimp.”

“Hey,” Lloyd pouted.

Zane jumped in. “Don’t be so mean, Jay.”

“It’s just friendly banter,” Lloyd said before they could get too serious with the conversation.

“Yeah. What else do we have if we don’t have friendly banter?”

Another crunch in the snow as Zane shifted. Lloyd felt a rush of icy cold over his hand, and he felt Jay shiver behind him which must have meant that Zane had reached for them both. “Kai and Nya.”

“Yeah,” Lloyd said. “And soon they’ll have the sword.”

Quiet.

Wind.

Cold.

“What if they don’t?” Jay asked, his voice almost lost in the breeze.

“If they don’t get the sword?”

“Yeah.”

“They will,” Lloyd said, trying to convince himself as well. “They will.”

“What if we catch up?”

“Then…” Then what?

It was really cold out here. The ghosts were arguing about something. Lloyd tried dealing with the brightness again, just to see what was going on over there.

They were too high up now for most of the clouds, and the mountain was covered in snow and ice. Ah, that was why it was so bright. Though it didn’t help that whatever spell Morro kept him under felt like the darkest of nightmares.

Morro looked angry, though Lloyd was pretty sure he always looked angry. It was part of his personality, really. He was waving his arms around wildly, his voice raised but too far away for Lloyd to understand what he was saying.

The others were with him, hovering above the ground, ghostly green tails flickering through the snow like bad video game graphics. Except one, standing his ground, scythe in hand, as if someone might attack them at any moment.

Lloyd remembered that ghost. Ghoultar. He was exceptionally stupid but he was strong and good at following orders, which was all Morro needed from him. Bonus points: he already used a scythe for his own weapon, making Cole a good choice if he was going to possess anyone, much like Jay had been a good choice for Wrayth since he already used a chain. Lloyd cursed himself for thinking that way and blamed it on being under the ghosts’ control for so long. While he was at it, he would admit that Ghoultar’s skeleton vibe looked kind of wicked cool on Cole, and he would blame the ghosts for making him think that too.

(But hey, assuming they weren’t too horribly traumatized after all this was over, whenever it was over, next Day of the Departed was going to be awesome. He could already imagine the costumes.)

He saw the ghosts calming down a bit, their chatter slowing. They would be taking over again soon, he was pretty sure.

“Have you been fighting them?” he asked.

“Haven’t stopped,” Jay said.

“I’m growing tired of it, but yes,” Zane said.

“Don’t call me crazy just yet, but I think we should stop for a while.”

Jay sighed, heavy and dramatic. “If I had even an ounce more energy, I’d be screaming right now and you both know it.”

“I know it sounds stupid,” Lloyd said. “But I have an idea, but we can’t waste our strength if we’re going to pull it off.”

Another sigh, but less drama. “Okay. What is it?”

Good news: it  _ was _ warm in the Cloud Kingdom. Warm enough that Kai started shedding his coat before Nya stopped him and asked how he expected to stay warm when they got the sword and took it back to Ninjago with them.

He grumbled, because it was a fair point, but he decided to just carry it for now. Compared to the biting temperature on the mountain, this place felt like a tropical paradise.

Except for the fact that it was so...cloudy. Which he should have expected from the name. Not a bit of land in sight, just fluffy golden clouds, and towers and bridges somehow built into them, and little sailboats that seemed to float in the air with no mind for gravity at all.

And monks, so many monks. Writers of fate. Kai had half a mind to just ask these guys to write out a happy ending, since apparently they could actually speak things into existence. At least, he thought so, until the leader told them that since Morro had escaped, they had lost control and were trying to catch up with all of the changes to destiny. And didn’t that just sound  _ lovely _ . No pressure. It was only up to Kai and Nya now to fix everything.

Nya reached for his hand as they kept following Fenwick along a bunch of winding paths. Over bridges and around towers and onto one of the little sailboats that felt like it carried them halfway across the realm. Fenwick had left them by that point, apparently had to go get back to their game of catch-up against the ghosts, and let the monk guiding the boat answer any further questions.

“What’s in the tomb that’s so important?” Kai asked at some point, after he’d gotten sick of pacing across the tiny deck and sat down in a corner, his coat sitting next to him.

The monk sighed under her breath. “It’s kind of a long story, unless you know about the sixteen realms.”

Kai looked up at Nya, and she looked back.

“We don’t.”

Another sigh. “Of course you don’t. I really need to talk to Wu’s writer about all the secrets he keeps from you kids. This stuff didn’t stop being relevant when he got old.”

Kai scoffed. “Tell me about it.”

_ “I don’t know, Lloyd. That sounds risky.” _

_ “It’s a risk we’re going to have to take. We’re out of options.” _

_ “You really think this will work?” _

_ “I hope so.” _

They were running again.

Chasing. Again.

Funny how they could literally be in the realm where fate was written, and yet fate would  _ still _ have it that Morro and his band of ghosts somehow found another entrance to this place. Not only that, but  _ of course _ the leader of all the monks was actually  _ helping  _ them.

“I knew he was trying to get us lost!” Kai shouted over his shoulder for possibly the millionth time.

Nya was right on his heels, close enough to land a smack on the back of his head before continuing past him. “Stop acting all high and mighty just because you didn’t remember the way back!”

She stopped suddenly, and Kai didn’t stop in time, crashing into her and sending both of them toppling to the thankfully soft cloudy ground. The physics of this place were  _ really _ messing with his head.

“Ow.” He sat up. “What the hell.”

“Sorry,” Nya grumbled, sitting up as well. She looked up at the tower in front of them. The one that they had seen the ghosts enter a few minutes ago, all casual like those scumbags had been  _ invited _ here. Kai was ready to blow a fuse just thinking about it. At least until Nya spoke up again. “How are we supposed to get up there in time?”

Kai followed her gaze. It was one of the biggest towers around here. Definitely the most decorated. He felt stupid for not realizing that these people would keep a magical sword in their fanciest temple. But yeah, sure, lead them on a bunch of weird paths and distant bridges and, again, a sailboat halfway across the  _ realm _ —

He cut himself off there before he lost too much focus. This wasn’t helping. They needed to find a way to the top that preferably didn’t involve stairs. The mountain had been enough of a climb for one day, thank you.

“Airjitzu,” he said without much further thought. It wouldn’t get them all the way to the top, but there were plenty of floaty boats around this tower that they could use, like a platform challenge video game. (Too bad Jay wasn’t here to be proud of him for that comparison.)

Nya looked at him with wide eyes. “Not sure where you think I figured out how to do airjitzu since we got here. But sure, you could do that. How am  _ I _ going to get up there?”

“Same way we got in,” Kai said, getting to his feet. They didn’t have time for another idea. They had to get to the top floor  _ now _ . He held out his hand. “I’ll carry you.”

“I’m getting real tired of looking like a damsel in distress,” Nya said. But she got up anyway, pointedly  _ not _ taking Kai’s hand, which he decided was fair. He didn’t imagine she looked very dignified when he’d picked her up bridal style to get them through the portal.

But still, this was  _ important. _ This was about more than Nya’s image. Especially because literally no one else here even cared how she appeared right now.

“Look,” he said, trying not to sound as riled up as he felt. “You either learn airjitzu in the next three seconds, or I’m carrying you to the top. Or I could leave you behind.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“You’re right, I wouldn’t.” He held out his hand. “But I will get to the top of that tower. Do you need my help or not?”

Nya blinked. Looked up again. Looked down at his hand, and groaned. “Okay, but you’re giving me a piggy-back this time.”

“Fine by me.”

Airjitzu, for the record, was not easy. It was a lot like spinjitzu, with the added difficulty of fighting gravity and maintaining balance and not landing on your face or bumping into anything that could throw off your focus. It had taken a while to learn, even with all the motivation they had.

Doing airjitzu while carrying another human being was infinitely harder.

But somehow, they had made it through the blind man’s eye and somehow, Kai only took a tumble a couple times on the floaty boats. Nya helped him back up every time and made no more fusses about being carried, which was very considerate of her. And, yeah, somehow they made it to the top. Though the landing on the balcony of the top floor was just as rough as the other bruising falls. Kai was definitely ready to spend a few days with his good friend the ice pack when this was all over.

Of course the ghosts had made it to the top already and of course they saw Kai and Nya coming. They had a sword that could predict their opponent’s every move, so why wouldn’t they see the exact moment that Kai and Nya gathered the rest of their energy and broke through the window, or the moment they threw their aeroblades which of course then missed their mark and got lodged in the far wall?

The thought  _ If only I had my powers _ ran through Kai’s head countless times as they broke into fighting. Again.

He was getting very, very tired of this game.

Get to this important and well-protected relic before the ghosts do. Whoops, the ghosts got there first. Now chase them on the docks over water with deadly seaweed or up a mountainside with deadly wind or to the upper floor of a temple in a parallel realm why not. At this point the ghosts would make it to the tomb first too!

“Kai!”

He fell to the ground with another bruising thump, hardly aware of what was even happening anymore. The world around him was a bit blurry. He must have hit his head on something.

Kai sat up with his hand to his head. Please don’t let that be a concussion, he didn’t have time for a concussion.

Except, he didn’t have much time to sort out how badly he’d hit his head. Because as soon as the room stopped spinning, he almost wished he’d been knocked out.

Nya had pushed him out of the way of something, he’d already gathered that. At first he thought it might have been an arrow, the Archer was right there, or a gust of wind from Morro, or a lash of chains or a scythe or he could run through an extensive list of weapons in the ghostly arsenal right now. But he didn’t expect the one they had actually used.

Kai shook his head, hoping that it really was a concussion and that he wasn’t actually watching his sister slowly going pale like she’d suddenly become horribly sick, slumped against the wall with her eyes wide, her body jerking in odd ways, trying to fight off the ghost that had pinned her there.

It was no use, of course. He’d seen this happen already, though not this close up. He could see the fear in her eyes as she tried desperately to fight a losing battle. Kai felt his blood run cold as an instinct told him to run,  _ run _ , get the hell out of there you idiot! But he couldn’t move. He couldn’t leave. He couldn’t tear his eyes away as Nya suddenly went still, and she turned that same disgusting ghostly green as all the others. Her new gi turned black, soaked in ink, frayed and tattered and glowing green at the edges. She had closed her eyes when the fight was over and now she opened them again, only it wasn’t her. He knew it wasn’t her. His little sister would never look at him like that.

Shit, he needed to  _ run _ .

Kai didn’t have time to process any of it. It had all happened too fast and all he knew was that he needed to get out of there, and fast. Screw the sword, If he didn’t leave now he wouldn’t get out alive.

It didn’t hit him that he was alone now until he had somehow leaped over the table in the middle of the room to grab the aeroblades and broken through the wall with this fight-or-flight strength. Not until he’d let that fear fling him over the railing on the balcony onto a well-timed boat and almost off the edge of that as well if the monk driving it hadn’t grabbed his hood and pulled him back. Which was good, because there were no other convenient boats to leap to. He was lucky he’d made it this far.

He turned back, shaking so hard he could barely move, not sure if he was even breathing.

The ghosts were on the balcony now, though they didn’t seem intent on chasing him. Actually, they were smiling. Sick, creepy, evil sort of smiles. Morro had a shiny golden sword in one hand, his other resting on the shoulder of—

On the shoulder of someone who was not Nya. Not Nya, not Nya, not Nya.

The ghosts all looked back at him, and that was when he realized it. He was alone.

Five ghosts, all staring at him with bright green eyes. The faces of his friends, his brothers, his sister.

They had taken everything.

And he was alone.

Morro smiled at him again, the same dark creepy twisted — UGH.

If Kai had his powers they would be so  _ dead _ right now!

So  _ what _ if he couldn’t summon a flame? Maybe he didn’t need fire to fight them. No. He did  _ not _ need his powers. He had a sword, and his two hands, and a whole lot of pent up rage clawing its way out, ready to strike whenever he was ready.

Damn it all. He was ready.

If Morro noticed when Lloyd had gone quiet, either he didn’t react or he just didn’t care. Lloyd, for his part, took the small victories when they were offered to him, and he hoped that the others were in the same boat. A lot of this plan depended on him (“Of course it does,” Jay had said. “Not  _ my _ fault he chose me,” Lloyd had retorted.) but he still hoped he’d have at least two of them at his side when he chose to strike.

It was so tempting to fight back, from the moment they were possessed again, following Bansha through her back door into the Cloud Kingdom. And again when the leader of the monks assured them that the other ninja were too far away, too lost in the clouds to even try to find their way back. And yet again when Morro looked into the blade of the sword and saw the attack from Kai and Nya coming.

The Archer had stolen a skiff for them after Bansha took Nya.

“Careful with that one,” Wrayth said as he climbed aboard. “She’s the master of water.”

“You must think I’m an idiot.” She whapped him over the head, and he only laughed. Lloyd winced and knew too well that the ghosts had a limited sense of physical pain. Jay would have a nasty headache when they escaped.

_ If they escaped. _

No. No. They were going to escape.

They just had one thing to do to help Kai first.

Lloyd ignored most of the bickering after that. He only needed to stay alert enough to see what was happening. Anything beyond that was a waste of energy, and he would need every last ounce if he was going to pull this off.

A loud shout came from behind them, and Lloyd wasn’t sure if it was his own thoughts or Morro’s that said, ah of course, here comes the fire.

Another skiff was coming up behind them, wobbly but gaining speed. Kai was at the helm, looking equal parts terrified and enraged. And as annoying as that would have been in almost any other circumstance, Lloyd was actually proud for once to see Kai taking charge and acting on instinct.

Before he could get too happy, Morro looked away and forced Lloyd to do the same. “We have the sword. Get back down to Ninjago. We’ll lose him on the mountain.” He sounded so calm, like he thought Kai didn’t stand a chance. Lloyd was tempted to fight that, but he reminded himself to hold back. Just a bit longer.

Somehow the ghosts knew exactly where to find the blind man’s eye again, which was well and good because Lloyd definitely hadn’t been keeping track and he was fairly certain the others weren’t either. Except maybe Zane, because Zane kept track of pretty much everything.

When they entered the stream of swirling gray cloud, the wind picked up though the air had been perfectly calm everywhere else in the realm, and both their boat and Kai’s were swept up in the current. They went around in circles a few times before hitting the middle, and Lloyd managed one last glimpse of Kai’s fire before a sudden lurch as it felt like the entire world dropped out from under him, and they were falling. Sure, they barely felt the extreme cold on the peak of the mountain but of course now Lloyd could feel every nerve-wracking millisecond of the plunge from the cloud back to earth, and he was sure if the fall didn’t kill him, the tumbling of his stomach might.

Thankfully, he didn’t have to worry about either. Maybe he could thank the ghosts for that.

They hit the ground with a painful thud that Lloyd was sure he would feel later, but for now it barely knocked the ghosts off balance. And then they were sliding, the hull of the boat cutting through a stretch of snow that looked like it might carry them all the way down the mountain. Or at least back to the layer of normal, not-solid clouds.

Morro’s thoughts said  _ We only need to get past the clouds. The ninja will give up after that. _

And now, Lloyd was ready to fight back.  _ You’re a fool if you think any of us would ever give up. _

“Jay! Zane!”

Wrayth and the Archer both turned their heads, and in a brief moment of clarity because the ghosts had been caught off guard, Lloyd saw the green in their eyes flicker away. Zane nodded, and Jay smiled. A real, genuine human smile.

_ No! _

And then Lloyd’s mind grew foggy again, and all his focus went back into the fight.

He could feel the world around him in flashes here and there, could see Jay and Zane fighting to hold on just the same as him, and fighting off Bansha and Ghoultar while they were at it. He hoped Nya and Cole would catch on, but if not, at least the ghosts were slowed down by their human bodies.

Lloyd pulled his focus back to the boat. They had to slow it down, had to give Kai a chance to catch up. He found a rope, hoped it would work, opened the sails. Oh, it did work. Nice. It didn’t give them too much resistance, but it did slow them down a little.

A chain whipped past him, and Lloyd turned to watch the blade sink into the snow.

“Doesn’t this thing have an anchor?”

Jay shrugged as well as he could while keeping his grip on the chain. “I don’t know! I couldn’t find one.”

“I can’t imagine they would need anchors on boats floating in the air!” Zane’s voice cutting above the wind and the constant crunch of snow and another round of clanging metal. Lloyd had lost track of him, Morro was putting up one hell of a fight.

He heard Kai’s boat come alongside them just as he was wondering how much longer they could keep the ghosts at bay, heard another feral yell as Kai made the leap (seriously, an idiotic move under any other circumstance, but they were all well beyond desperate at this point) and landed next to Morro.

_ Let me back in!! _

No, no. Lloyd shook his head. He was in control, if only for another moment or two.

_ Let me IN!!! _

Just another moment!

Lloyd felt himself drop. Wasn’t sure if he felt it or Morro felt it or where he even was on the boat anymore. He was on the floor somewhere, that was for sure. It was too much work to fight off the ghost screaming in his brain and to stand up all at the same time.

“Kai!” he managed to get out, a hint of Morro’s voice still laced in with his own.

_ Don’t do it!!! _

Again. “Kai!”

“Lloyd!” Oh, Kai’s voice was right next to him.

The wind was so cold, he could feel it on his face, rushing past, his ears popping as they kept sledding downward, faster and faster with every passing second. Jay must have gotten pulled back into a fight, or taken over by his ghost again. They didn’t have long.

“Lloyd, hold on! Stay with me!”

He shook his head. This wouldn’t last. He’d known that already. Morro was really going to hurt him for this later, but it was another risk he was willing to take. “Kai, take the sword.”

Hands on his shoulders. On his back. “Keep fighting, Lloyd, you can do it.”

“I can’t.” Not yet. Not this time. “The sword, Kai. You have to beat him to the tomb.”

Then, a hand on his, gently pulling the sword from his grasp. “I’ll come back for you.”

Lloyd managed to nod, but the world was getting dark again and he was already losing control of his body. The noises of fighting were dying down. The wind didn’t feel as cold.

“Kai, you have to go.”

“I’m going, I’m going.”

But Lloyd never felt the hand leave his, at least not before it went numb as he lost control.

Just before the world faded again, he felt...something. Something touched his forehead. And a small sound. A kiss, maybe. Kai kissed his forehead. Okay, that sounded not at all like something Kai would do, but okay.

Desperate times, he thought.

“I’ll get you guys back,” Kai’s voice said in the edges of his consciousness. “Don’t worry.”

No, Lloyd wasn’t worried.

He knew Kai would come back for them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've revived my tumblr (mostly just for art) and made an instagram (also mostly for art haha)
> 
> [original ghost au tag](https://thatoneninjagosideblog.tumblr.com/tagged/ghost-au)
> 
> [instagram](https://www.instagram.com/gardenjays/)   
>  [art tumblr](https://gardenjays.tumblr.com/)   
>  [ninjago tumblr](https://thatoneninjagosideblog.tumblr.com/)

**Author's Note:**

> there's a link to my old tumblr in the beginning notes but I haven't touched tumblr in like 2 years so unfortunately I do not have any social media to plug here
> 
> another fun fact: I only just watched season 10 like a few weeks ago and I REGRET not watching it sooner??? it's so much better than I expected it to be ;;;


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